April  11, 2020

BOX

The box is filled – packed,

sealed, taped, addressed,

stamped at the post office.

It’s shipped in a van or truck.

Or it moves by plane – across –

space to space, from place

to place – till it reaches its

destination. It’s opened. Its

contents are checked out.

Then the call that it has arrived.

“Thanks!” Life.  Birth to death.

Nativity to Easter – with the

many quiet Saturdays – with

the many waits in between.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April  11, 2020

Thought  for  Today 

“There are some people that if they don’t know, you can’t tell them.”

Louis Armstrong

April  10,   2020

Thought for Today

“What do we do when the foolishness of the cross actually makes more sense than the wisdom of the sword?”

Shane Claiborne,

The Irresistible Revolution:

Living as an Ordinary Radical

April   10,  2020 

UNDER  THE  CROSS

I stand under the cross wishing

I could hear Jesus’ words to Mary and John

addressed to me:

“Woman, this is your son!”

and “This is your mother.”

I stand under the cross wishing

I could say what the Centurion said,

“Truly this was the Son of God.”

I stand under the cross watching

the scene between the Good Thief

and the Bad, but their voices are about

saving oneself and being saved and

robbing paradise at the last minute,

aren’t my scene either.

I stand under the cross wishing

I could say, “I am thirsty” wishing

my faith was thirstier,  but it’s not.

I stand under the cross in the dark

seeing the spit and the blood on the ground,

wondering down deep if the echo of curses

in the air still being thrown at Jesus

are my inner sounds. I hope not. No Never.

I stand under the cross and hear,

“Father forgive them because they

don’t know what they are doing.”

I stand under the cross saying and praying,

“That’s me. You know me. Into your hands,

O God, I hand over my spirit. Amen.”

© Reflections, Andy Costello

SELF-RELIANCE

Somewhere along the line someone spotted a postcard - with our family name on it - along with our family coat of arms - along with our family motto.  They sent it to me.  

I wasn't in on the drafting of the shield, or the motto or the coat of arms.  I didn't even know we had a coat of arms.  My mom described where she came from in Ballynahown, Ireland, "Ireland has nothing." I saw the spot - on Galway Bay - as not that hot.

And my father used to say that he was within a rock's throw of where my mom was from. 

Asked to translating the Latin on the coat of arms, I said it means something like,  "Don't be searching for yourself, outside yourself." 

"Quaeseveris" is the only tricky word of the 4 words in the motto.  The quest, the seeking, the searching, the asking is at the heart of the motto.

"Quaeseveris" is the 2nd person perfect active subjunctive of the verb "quaero". It means questing,  as indicated, asking,  seeking, inquiring, requiring. 

I would like to translate it  as: "Be who you is, because if you  be who you're not, then you're not who you is."

Ralph Waldo Emerson calls this "Self-Reliance."

Here is Emerson's famous lecture on Self-Reliance. Just hit the triangle on the button.

April  9, 2020

COMPASS

Walking - early morning - in the woods –

coming to patches of light and darkness –

depending on the steep of the low hills -

then deeper and deeper into the trees ….

I come to a clearing - a palace place of light….

The light seems to be forming halos around

all the trees in the forest - lessening the

darkness everywhere - north, east, south, west.

It was as if I was standing in a compass of light,

and I stood there  wondering if God the Father

had the particularity he had about Mary for the

tree 2,000 years ago chosen to be the cross of Christ.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April 9, 2020

Thought for Today

“When I ask people for bread to feed the poor, they think I am a saint; when I ask them why the poor are hungry, they think I am a Communist.”  

Brazilian Bishop 

Dom Heldler Camara

April  8, 2020

AUTOBIOGRAPHY

There’s one book worth reading…. 

We don’t have to write it, but that 

book would be really worth reading. 

It’s our Autobiography. Then again, 

It would be really worth writing. Give it 

a title for starters. You can revise it. 

Where were you born? 

Where have you been? 

Where did you hope to go? 

Whom have you met? 

Best days? Worst days? 

10 top things than changed you. 

10 top things you have learned. 

10 top books you have read. 

10 top surprises that surprised you. 

10 gifts you never expected.
10 twists and turns.
10 persons who changed your life.

Sit down at your computer. 

Pick up your pen. Get a 

spiral note book and write. 

For whom? For yourself. 

Then picture yourself reading 

it in your old age. Wow God! 

It’s for yourself, but picture 

your great granddaughter, 

finding it 3 years after you’re gone. 

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April  8,  2020

Thought   for   Today

“Every day and every hour, every minute, walk around yourself and   watch yourself, and see that your image is a seemly one.” 

Father Zossima in 

The Brothers Karamazov

April  7,  2020

SATAN  ENTERED  HIM

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Tuesday in Holy Week is, “Satan  Entered  Him.”

Those 3 words - right there in today’s gospel – in John 13: 27 – hit me.

“Satan Entered Him.” Those words  entered into me.

That’s something that happens to us when we read strong stuff – and if a sermon has salty stuff –  we’re can be aware of what’s enlightening us – what’s challenging us - and what is entering into us.

We all have this current fear that the coronavirus 19 might enter into us.

It’s an invisible enemy  that can kill us – so we fear it – and we take precautions – to prevent it from entering us.

Is that why those 3 words in today’s gospel – ‘Satan entered him”- hit me.

INSIDE JOB

Down through the years, e.e. cummings words, “Be of love a little more careful than of anything”  has entered  into me.

I’ve have also thought, “Be of hate or hurt a little more careful than of anything.”

So too prejudice – so too anger – so too greed – so too what I’m watching on TV - so too movies - so too attitude – so too the atmosphere we can feel in  the rooms  we enter.

Without knowing it – without choice – without voting for it – we become what we read, what we see, what we eat, what we breathe in.

I love Tennyson’s words in his poem Ulysses, “I am part of all that I have met.”

We speak English because that’s the language that entered into as a kid in the playground and the playpen. “Give Little Johnny a turn.”  “Stop being such a baby!” “Wash your hands!” “Do your homework.” “Say your prayers.”

THE BAD STUFF

In a reflection for today -  in Give Us This Day -  Immaculee Ilibagiza says, “On April 7, 1994, radio stations in Rwanda transmitted a fearsome message: it was time to ‘cut the tall trees’ and eliminate the ‘cockroaches.’  Upon this signal, Hutu militia began the wholesale extermination of their Tutsi neighbors and moderate Hutus.  In the course of a hundred  days nearly a million people were killed – mostly by machetes and other primitive weapons. Many of the massacres occurred in churches, where Tutsis had sought refuge. That such horror could occur in a predominantly Catholic country raised troubling  questions about the meaning of evangelization. Nuns, priests, and catechists were among the victims. (In other cases, shockingly, they collaborated with the killers.) Church leaders, whether Catholic or Protestant, were largely mute.” [p. 96, April, 2020]

That’s tough stuff that entered into me when I read that last night.

I remember watching in shock some of that on television when it was happening. It happened again  years later when I was reading Immaculee Ilibagiza book – Left to Tell.   It’s all about this.

When – how many times – and in what ways did that attitude of anger and envy and smallness and “Kill!” enter into the psyche of some Hutus of Rwanda?

CONCLUSION:  OUR CHOSEN CALL

Our chosen call as Christians and Redemptorists  has been to bring Good News to folks – after it enters into us.

The hope is that we reach out for Christ and eat him up - as well as his whole body in communion.

The hope is that his real presence and his love and respect for all enters into all of us.

The hope is that the Word becomes flesh and consumes us.

It’s the same hope we have when we listen carefully to each other each day when we come into each other’s real presence.

It’s the same hope we have when we hear the first reading at each Mass.

Today it was from Isaiah. We read him. We listen to him. Hopefully he enters into us.  

Did you notice the two images from today’s first reading – that we become sharp swords and polished arrows.

Unlike Judas we’re not in this for the money – but for the feast!

April  7,  2020

OTHERWISE

How many people pause to think

what the other side, the flip side of

what they are looking at,  looks like?

Otherwise they might miss ½ of what

is right in front of them. Divorces are

inevitable and questions aren’t asked.

Wisdom comes by tragedy and stupidity.

Wisdom comes from questions and time.

Notice,  the wise in the word: otherwise.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April  7,  2020

Thought   for  Today

“Nothing  is  worth more than this day.”  

Goethe

April  6,  2020

SOME   WORDS

Some words have speakers

attached to them  - like those

birthday cards that play music

when you open them up. They

call for double postage but

some of them are neat ….

Take gravel – when I see that word -

I can hear it squirm under the tire of

my eye - as I drive over it on a page –

so too mention of cockroaches and

mosquitoes and crocodiles.  They make

my face tighten up and squirm each time.

Then there are words that are as smooth

as butter or ice cream – blue sky words –

easy on the eyes – easy on the ear.

Well then, I hope my words bring peace

and serenity and nobody sees me as

an alligator coming up a gravel path.

  

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April  6, 2020

Thought  for  Today

“Every prayer reduces itself to this: ‘Great  God,  grant that two twice two is not four.’” 

Ivan Turgenev

[1818-1883], 

Prayer.

DIFFERENT  PALM  SUNDAY

He had traveled down many streets before –

and roads and paths and ways as well.

But today – today would be different!

He hadn’t been on a donkey since

he was kid – before he could walk.

But today – today would be different.

He’d see faces he saw before, faces

that were question marks and periods.

But today – today would be different.

He would see faces that were exclamation points

and lips and voices that would be singing Hosanna.

But today – today would be different.

No parables, no miracles, no hands holding

rocks – no sons and daughters to be healed.

But today – today would be different.

He would go by the temple with  their money changers

and the birds of air in cages to be bought for sacrifice.

But today – today would be different.

He would go by the market places and see the

bread and wine for sale and people with pieces of silver.

But today would be different.

He’d be walking with Thomas with his doubts and Judas

with his plans for  a different way to be doing one’s life.

But today would be different.

He would be thinking of his Father – his mysterious will –

and what would be happening this whole week.

But this week – this week would be different.

He would see Peter with hand on his knife and fear

in his closed fist trying to figure out who this Man was.

But this week – this week would be different.

He’d have his Last Meal with his disciples, wash their feet, tell them it’s about washing each other’s feet and loving one another.

But that night  - that night would be different.

He’d see John pulling together the words he spoke and

his eyes were filled with the insights he had passed over.

But that night – that night would be different.

He’d notice where the garden was – where he’d need help

to finally let go – and at least an hour in prayer together.

But that night – that night would be different.

He’d see his arrest, the kiss, the mocking, the beating,

the dragging to jail by those who wanted to erase him.

But that night – that night would be different.

He’d see Pilate and Herod and the High Priests conspiring

together because of the envy and fear that choked them.

But this Friday – this Friday would be different.

He’d see the crowds screaming for his life

And Barabbas being given a second chance.

But this Friday – the Friday would be different.

He see the same  streets he was about to see today

again next Friday – but filled with blood and skin and tears.

But this Friday – this Friday would be different.

He saw himself nailed to the cross with Mary and his

friends weeping underneath him as he dies on the cross.

But this Friday – this  Friday would be different.

But this Palm Sunday – this moment - it was time to get

up on the donkey – and proceed to his last week.

But this day, this week, this Easter, this year, will be different.

© Andy Costello

Coronavirus 19 Week

April  5,  2020

CHOICE  OR  CONFORMITY

Why do we do what we do?

Do we really know or do we

do the things we do robotically?

There is such a thing as muscle memory.

Is there such a thing as choice memory?

Or do we just go with the flow or the crowd?

When it comes to reactions do we have

buttons that people push and  we laugh

or clap or vote the way others want us to?

Is the solution to self observe?

Is the issue: it all depends?

Is the solution, “Let’s go to the video tape?

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2020

April  5, 2020 

Thought  for  Today 

“Sinatra. What's with this final curtain? Is God disturbed churches are packed Palm Sunday, Easter and Christmas and not in between? Will we feel the fateful lightening of his terrible swift sword? Is this Armageddon?”

Buck Malachi